March 14, 2024 • 34 mins
Ever wonder how a young professional can go from a MHA graduate of the University of Utah, a CAHME Accredited program, to a health tech industry expert and master networker?
In this episode of Master Your Healthcare Career we welcome Alex Maiersberger. Alex is a Global Principal for Health Care at SAS, the category leader in AI and Analytics.
Prior to joining SAS, Alex served in corporate strategy at sector leaders Blue Cross in North Carolina, and Geisinger Health Plan. But underlying a career growth path is something different…what he did for others.
Alex co-founded the Advancement League, and the formation of their annual event, the Young Health Leader Summit. This membership organization focuses on helping health care leaders find and align their personal mission with leading organizations through carefully curated events and retreats that start with community impact.
Alex’s underlying message of being confident in yourself and your career path is essential to all.
Tune in to listen to this episode now!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Thank you, Melissa, for that introduction and a warm
welcome today to AlexMayersberger, who is joining us
on a special call today, andI've had some discussions with
Alex around his work with theAdvancement League.
I'm really excited to talk tohim.
He is a young professionalwho's making a difference.
And, Alex, just to kind ofbegin, could you give us a
(00:23):
little bit of your backstoryabout you know?
You graduated from a CamiAccredited Program, University
of Utah, and right now you're aglobal expert at SAS.
So can you kind of fill thegroup in with that a little bit?
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, it's such an honor to be here as well.
I think we'll probably get intoit a little bit, but this is a
full circle moment in my life,as you mentioned a graduate from
a Cami Accredited Program andat one point, choosing graduate
school obviously is a big lifedecision.
There's student loans.
I had a young child duringgraduate school, and so it was
family dynamics, all the thingsand the program that I went to
(01:00):
actually, when I firstregistered for school, was not
Cami Accredited, and so it wasthat leap of faith.
But the leap of faith that Iwas taking was because the
program director had promised atwhat point she said we will be
Cami Accredited by the end ofyour tenure here, and so it was
a bet I was making, and a largepart of that bet was on that
Cami Accreditation, and so Iremember just the sleepless
(01:24):
nights and the worries of makingsure that the word Cami means a
lot to me personally, and sothis is super exciting.
So, like you said, I leadglobal product marketing for
healthcare at SAS data andanalytics and AI company, which
is really exciting.
It's been a fun career journey.
I've gone from small healthtech startup to hospital
(01:47):
administrator, to insuranceleader, to global technology
leader and so kind of traversedthe healthcare ecosystem bingo
card.
And along the way, a fewfriends and I created the Young
Health Leader Summit leadingevent for early career
professionals.
And now, as our hair gets alittle grayer on the sides, we
(02:08):
have a good mentor of ours andone of our early career CEOs, dr
David Feinberg, who's nowchairman of Oracle.
He jokes that as we've kept theevent going, that it needs to
be called the Middle Age Summit,at least now.
So we've had a lot of fun alongthe way.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Alex, there's an interesting point in your career
journey where all of a suddenyou go from the young person
who's the exciting youngprofessional to the
mid-careerist that everyone goesto advice, to the older
statesmen or the elder statesmen, and you don't notice those
trends kind of going in yourcareer but they do happen and
(02:45):
they're kind of startling inyour professional career.
I love SAS, I have to say.
I know it's known as the SASInstitute now and kudos for
working there.
I used SAS back in myundergraduate day with punch
cards so I mean that's how old Iam and again that journey
(03:05):
through there.
But SAS is really one of theleading statistical packages
that was out there and they'vecertainly brought in their
perspective and really kind ofneat that you're the global lead
there, so that's kind of cool.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yeah, it's an incredible place and I think
people recognize SAS from a lotof the Forbes articles or the
cultural aspect of it.
They're very unique.
It's been a private company for50 years and so it's been a
unique way to reinvest inemployees.
They've created this amazingcampus environment where we have
a health care center that has alot of unique aspects for the
(03:43):
way they take care of theiremployees physical, mental,
emotional health, as well assoccer fields and pools and all
the fun stuff as well.
So you'll have a call with acolleague at 10 am sometimes
they just came from a workintramural soccer game and
you're like, wait a minute, whyam I not out playing soccer?
But the other exciting thing,like you said, is they've been
(04:05):
able to reinvest so much backinto the platform and the
programming and so it started asthat statistical language and
has now really evolved into anend-to-end platform and so
really interesting things.
I call it sort of foundationaland future of some of the
foundational back endinfrastructure type things,
(04:25):
cohort building within to targetdiabetic populations or for
payers, or different things, aswell as future predictive models
and governing the newest AI,and so really, really fun, lots
of great customers and, to yourpoint lots of great customers
that we've had for 50 years or40 or 50 years around the world,
(04:46):
and so you really get to hearsome insight into the stories of
how is this hospital dealingwith the optimization of their
staffing workforce in Spain.
And then you get to go to apayer in Indianapolis or
wherever it is in the UnitedStates and you get to hear how
have they been dealing withthese challenges and what are
they doing, what have they beeninvesting in over the last 20
years from a technologystandpoint?
(05:06):
And so it's been an incrediblelearning place and an incredible
leading place.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Now one of the fascinating things to me about
SAS is their investment in youand your mission around the
advancement league.
I mean, you see, sas isinvolved with that.
And again, what makes a companya great company A great company
is when they invest in thoughtleadership and they're not just
worried about selling you astatistical package, they're
worrying about how do we movethe field forward.
(05:33):
And when I look at what SAS didwith you in the advancement
league, to me that kind ofrepresents a great company kind
of moving forward.
And so a little bit about theadvancement league.
I think you and I have talkedabout it before in the past.
What really is interesting tome around that is how you and a
(05:56):
gentleman named Antoine Williamsgot together and said, hey, we
have an idea and we're going tomove forward with it.
So if you could kind of tellour listeners about that idea.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Yeah, early career is very difficult and I think it's
very difficult to articulatesort of what you're going
through, especially in what wedid was an administrative
fellowship program together, andso you are reporting to the CEO
of a hospital.
Very early in your career.
You have this very in-depthlook at executive leadership and
you're tasked with some reallyimportant responsibilities.
(06:29):
The challenge is you're beingtrained to be a hospital CEO and
if you feel somewhere withinyour skill set or your heart
that you don't want to be ahospital CEO, it's really hard.
Who do you tell that to?
You can't go to your boss andbe like hey, you've invested a
bunch of money and time andeffort into me and now I'm
realizing I don't want to dothis.
(06:50):
And it's really hard to go tosome even program members that
are sort of at the same time asyou, because in some ways you're
competing with them for afuture role, and so it becomes
really difficult to articulatehey, I'm struggling here, I
don't know that this is a fitfor me, what else is out there?
And you're also just so busywith work and maybe some of your
(07:11):
personal life, your startingyoung family, whatever it is
that it just gets reallydifficult to surround yourself
with new people, and so ifyou're surrounded by all
hospital people and you say, hey, I don't know if I want to work
in a hospital anymore, how doyou go out and find the time and
find the people to get someresources around?
What else is out there in theworld?
And so we were really fortunateto create a close friendship
(07:32):
Myself, antoine Williams, samBelukoff, who's now out at
Kaiser.
Of all the hard jobs in theworld, he leads Moanalua Medical
Center in Honolulu, hawaii.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Oh I feel bad for him , right.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yes, we came from some tough days in Northeast
Pennsylvania and guys and hertogether, and we've all headed
to warmer locations.
I'm now in North Carolina.
Antoine is down at OrlandoHealth after some stints in
Detroit, michigan as well atHenry Ford.
But really it started as we hadsome of these conversations at
lunch or things where we'd sayhey, and it was usually me, I
(08:06):
was probably the odd man out oflike, hey, I don't know if I
signed up for all of this andwhat else is out there.
And so they'd say, hey, I havea friend that went to grad
school that didn't choose thehospital path.
Maybe you could reach out tohim or maybe you could talk to
her.
And so we started saying, hey,if we're having these
conversations, maybe it's, maybethere's other people like us
that are having theseconversations and there's no
(08:27):
real place that we can go tohave them.
So we actually just posted a Ithink the original one was on
Instagram and it was called ahealth care road trip and we
said we've got a couple friendsvisiting from a hospital out in
Cleveland.
They're going to be in townspending the night at our house
for the weekend.
If anybody wants to come meetup with us on a Saturday morning
.
We've got a few people ready totalk health care, and the first
(08:50):
health care road trip that wehosted there were people that we
did not know.
It just speaks to the power ofthe internet too.
People that we did not knowrented cars in New York City and
drove three and a half hoursout to Danville, pennsylvania
which if you've ever been there,it's a little tough to navigate
to and get to and showed upthat morning to say, hey, we
want to talk health care.
We saw this on the internet,and so that snowballed into an
(09:13):
event called the Young HealthLeader Summit.
We said can we do this in amore coordinated way?
Can we do it more meaningfully?
And we're now in year six ofthat.
And then the Advancement Leagueis the wraparound package of
what we do outside of the event.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
It's fascinating.
I have been to Danville and,yes, it is kind of in the middle
of northeastern Pennsylvania, alittle bit of a ride from New
York City, a little bit of aride from Philadelphia, but an
incredible great system out atGeisinger to kind of spend some
time with.
There was a quote from PhilHudson, who's the CEO of Rock
(09:46):
Digital, and it was interestingCEO of Rock Digital and
screenwriter is what he listedas his title and he said Alex
has a unique ability to bringout the best in every, unique
ability to bring out the best ineveryone.
Alex, I don't know if you'veever heard me kind of talk to
students.
I mean, one of the things Ialways say to them is don't
(10:07):
network.
And they kind of look at melike I've got a third eye Help
people.
And I think what to me isimpressive about your journey is
you are really helping people,you are bringing out the best in
other people, you're creatingavenues for discussion that help
other people kind of moveforward and while doing that,
(10:29):
significantly helps yourself.
But I don't think you look atit as an approach of how do I,
alex, get better at the expenseof others, or who are the people
that I need to network higher,higher up in the chain, but how
do I kind of move everyoneforward with me and by doing
that, creating an amazingnetwork of people?
(10:50):
Your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
First, thanks for bringing up the Phil Hudson
quote.
What a great memory from thepast.
Those are an incredible personand screenwriter.
I believe he's got a newNetflix special but he's the
producer for of.
I think it's called Tacomasomething Tacoma FD it's a
firefighting comedy show, soplease go check that out.
So the quote about trying tohelp other people are bringing
(11:15):
out the best in other people.
I joke that I was blessed withthe anti-Michael Jordan gene,
where Michael Jordan once isknown for that hyper
competitiveness.
I actually just I love to seeother people win and it's
somewhere in my human naturethat I think there's room for
all of us and so if you win itdoesn't feel like oh shoot, I
(11:36):
lost, or I guess it's hey,someone else won and my time's
coming.
And I think some of that spawnsfrom just a fortunate position
to sort of be able to experiencea lot of different things in
life.
And one of the reallyunfortunate things I think that
I've seen at all differentstages of life unfortunately, is
(11:57):
friends pass away young becauseof drug addiction or car
crashes or just the difficultiesof life, and I've seen friends
near me go from sort of we'llcall it like low level
management to CEO in a veryshort span as well.
And so you see those two flipsides, or I've seen people kind
(12:18):
of seemingly have it all andlose it all very quickly.
And so I think those experiencesin life, the more you have them
and maybe the earlier you hadthem, makes it so that you
realize that everyone around youoffers something and you can
offer everyone around yousomething.
And so you truly sort of justdon't know what tomorrow brings.
(12:40):
And so the best thing I see somany people from a networking
perspective, exactly like yousaid, you sort of network up
naturally.
And so you go to an event andyou're like hey, and we've all
had that experience as well.
If you have that name badgehanging from your chest at an
event, I've had people come upand they look at you on the
elevator and your title isn'timportant enough, and you sort
(13:01):
of get that they read the titlereal quick and just immediately
turned back around instead ofhey, this is another human in
front of me.
What's going on in your life,what's interesting, what do you
like to do, all the things?
And so that person today mayhave a title that doesn't mean
anything to you, but tomorrowmay be the person that's leading
your division or at yourcompany doing something, and so
I've been really fortunate tosee some of those things in life
(13:23):
and it's really given me a goodperspective of the person next
to you can really be in yourneed today, or you can be in
their need tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Alex, you know what, and I remember being there.
I remember being at aconference and I was having a
conversation with someone andall of a sudden he caught the
badge of someone who was higherup than the manager of Graduate
Health Systems InformationCenter and he went by and then
(13:52):
off he went and I just Iremember kind of thinking, yeah,
that's an interesting way tonetwork, you know, and don't
remember whatever happened tothat person.
I wonder where they went inthere.
But I think it's a great lessonfor everyone to kind of talk
about is have a genuine interestin people and don't necessarily
(14:13):
worry about what's in it.
For me, and I think that's kindof the approach that you've
taken, you know, as we kind oftalked about the Advancement
League and what you're doingwith the Young Health Leaders
Summit, so talk a little bitabout the Young Health Leaders
Summit, where you know youtalked about its origins and
where it's beginning, and I'velooked at some of the YouTube
(14:34):
videos on it and some of theInstagram postings on it and
you've got something going there.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
So appreciate that we're so blessed and fortunate
to attract so many incredibleleaders from across the
healthcare ecosystem now, and soit probably started out quite a
bit with our kind of hospitaland network and people that were
genuinely interested in, hey, Iwant to be around other young
people or I want to be aroundother people at this stage of a
career.
And then, as we've progressedin our careers and sort of
(15:03):
traversed some of the healthcareecosystem, started to attract
some executives and some peoplewho want to give back, and so
now it's really this we call itthis magical mix of the kindest
collection of healthcare talent.
I think some people come to theYoung Health Leaders Summit.
There's sort of a naturalinclination so, naming it Young
Health Leaders Summit, youdefinitely get some early MHA
(15:23):
type students, mbas, mphs, a fewundergrads, and so you attract
some students.
You attract some people veryearly in their careers, maybe
first five years, whether it'shospital or health tech or other
ones.
And then what we've found theselast few years especially is
it's such a different world foryoung people right now because
of economic inflation, maybeeconomic uncertainty, just the
(15:46):
differing experiences that we'vegone through these last few
years that there's companiesthat want to attract these
people to their companies.
Or there's executives who wantto give back to mentor, who want
to be inspired to say, hey,what are the new technologies
that early careerists arelooking at?
What should we be thinkingabout as an organization that
we're thinking about differently.
And so this year we're soexcited.
(16:06):
We're in year six.
We've learned a lot, tested alot along the years.
Actually, you mentioned namebadges.
That we've all had thatexperience at an event.
We do no name badges.
Actually, the first year we didno name badges.
Second year we did no namebadges.
There's something magical aboutjust being in a room with
incredible people and saying youhave to sort of force yourself
(16:26):
to say this is my name, what'syours?
But as we've grown throughoutthe years now a couple hundred
people strong, at these events,we do a blank name badge on day
one and so you write whateveryou want to write and it's been
very powerful of a lot of peoplewill write their first name,
maybe organization.
Some people will write I'mlooking for a job, or I'm
looking for someone to be aguest on my podcast, whatever it
(16:49):
is.
And so we've seen justincredible relationships.
So incredible casual, try tokeep it.
And so before it's a casualaddress code, there's something
unique about being in shorts andhanging out with an executive
that just you can't get anywhereelse.
And this year is there's goingto be some magic, both in the
people.
There's definitely compoundinginterest in the finance world
(17:09):
and so if you invest, there'scompounding over time.
There's absolutely compoundinginterest in harassing people by
email.
So if you invite them in yearone, they don't respond.
Invite them year two, theydon't respond.
Invite them year three, theydon't respond.
Invite them year four, they say,hey, I'm busy those days.
Year five, they say hey, I'mbusy the years, those days.
(17:30):
And year six, we've had thespeakers that we tried to reach
out to in year one reach out tous and say, hey, how can we be
part of the Young Health LeaderSummit?
We'd love to come, we'd love tobe a part of it, and so
compounding interest in reachingout to people or doing anything
for six years straight, amagical mix of people and a
magical place in Windwood inMiami.
And so, for all the thought andenergy and effort we've put
(17:52):
into the people and the content,the agenda, the thoughtfulness
of the design of experiencesthat you'll have, everyone hears
all that and kind of then hearsMiami and they're like, oh yeah
, we'll be there, we'll be there.
We're slightly offended.
We have to lead with it.
It's in Miami in May, and so bea good time.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
There was an interesting part.
I read about what you do, too,with the Advancement League and
tell me if I got this wrong, butI read this and I was like, wow
, what an incredibly great idea.
You encourage sponsors to theorganization, but what you do is
you take the sponsorship moneyand you divide it up among the
(18:34):
attendees who have to use it forsome community impact.
Comment that I read was you'reserious about helping members
put health everywhere and thecomment is people get so
involved in that process oftaking that money and making an
impact that you see people intears and your goal is not to
(18:58):
get people crying, but you'vegot people really kind of
invested in making animprovement in the community.
Talk about how that came to be.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
It came the very first conference that we ever
went to, on the sort ofcompany's dime we'll call it.
We got sent to a conference andwe sort of were very early in a
career, and so early in acareer you're also very hyper
aware of your own financialstanding and the investment of
time and opportunity.
And so we went to this eventand we definitely wore our
(19:30):
nicest clothes and we sat aroundand ate at restaurants that we
probably had never eaten atbefore and saw the bills and all
the things.
And when we came back and hadto sort of report out on what we
did, it was the realizationsort of struck us of a lot of
the health care events that wego to.
We sort of were seeing thatmoney.
It was like we spent a bunch ofour organization's money.
(19:51):
We went and we talked about allthe health care problems, we
ate some fancy dinners and thenwe're right back in the place
that we were to start with.
And so we had a little bit ofthat realization that, hey, if
we ever have the chance to do ameaningful, large scale event,
we would do some good while wewere there.
And the other thought was,could you do some good in a lot
of different cities, and so ifwe held an event, could we do it
(20:13):
in 10 different cities or 100different cities throughout the
years, meaning that if you cameto our event every year, you now
had a chance to experience andgive back to those cities in a
meaningful way, and so you'dhave this just different
perspective across your careerof hey.
I've been to Memphis, tennessee,and I spent some time there
over a couple of days getting toknow people in the community
(20:33):
and working with them and seeingsome of the struggles and
challenges they had, and so it'sbeen an incredible run.
We've done it for five yearswhere we take physical cash from
sponsors, give it to attendees,put them in a group of
strangers, essentially, and givethem 24 hours and say your only
objective is to go out into thecommunity and spend it in a way
that makes a difference.
It's been absolutely incredible.
(20:54):
We've seen communities change,we've seen careers change, but
the story I always tells thatthere's a person that went was a
hospital administrator, gotthis envelope of cash which only
one group has ever lost theenvelope of cash they just
default brain, put it in abackpack and were like shoot, I
don't know where it is.
So we had people crawling underchairs trying to find it, but
we found it.
(21:16):
But she was in this group andbasically, with a group of
strangers of just a little bitof cash, was able to say, like
I'm willing to fight these otherstrangers to make sure that we
spend this money on pediatricmental health.
I think the most good that wecan do is helping the mental
health of young people.
It's going to change the future.
It changes communities, all thethings.
(21:36):
And then the realization struckof like now that I'm forced to
go put my money wherever mymouth is in a way that makes a
difference for a healthierfuture.
I don't actually do any of thatin my day job.
I have no relation to pediatricmental health and so shortly
after the event went back,started to research which
companies are tackling thisjoint, a startup in the
pediatric mental health space,and so the outcome of life maybe
(21:59):
changes in the outcome ofcareers and the good that she'll
be able to do in the worldchanged because of just a forced
exercise to say, if you reallyhave to spend money in a way
that you think makes adifference, where do you spend
it?
This year is going to be ourfirst year to change up actually
the impact competition.
We've learned so much from itand done so much good from it.
We're really going to startpartnering with some local
(22:22):
organizations that have longterm commitment to their the
home communities where we serve,and so this will be the first
year of, instead of that, 24hour community impact
competition.
It's going to be a hopefullylong term community impact on,
and so we have a pitchcompetition, still giving
sponsorship money, but workingwith some local organizations to
(22:44):
bring all that externalexpertise into the local
community and then pass it alongto people who are there and who
can continue it over time.
So we're excited to see how wecan evolve and see where it
takes it.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Alex, what an incredibly insightful approach
to take and what a really greatway to make an impact in the
community.
By making that impact in thecommunity, you're also
influencing people's careersdevelopment too in that process.
So it's a win-win all aroundand congratulations on doing
that.
Again.
(23:16):
I'll be reading a little bitmore about you in preparation
for this, and we do our homeworkwhen we talk to our guests.
One of the things that you wrotewas the importance of learning
to do one thing at a time andbecoming an expert in that one
thing at a time, and I had aconversation.
(23:37):
Why that really kind of stuck tome is.
I had a conversation with my sona couple weeks ago and I'm
actually a grandfather nowwatching my granddaughter
approach nine months at thispoint and we were talking about
how the pediatricians said whatlittle kids do is they focus on
(23:58):
one developmental task, and thatcould be crawling or could be
babbling, or, but they reallywork on doing that until they
become an expert on it and thenthey move on to the next.
And those two kind of thoughtscame to mind as I was reading
what you wrote and what my sonwas talking to me about and I
(24:18):
went hey, there's something inthere about becoming an expert
in an area and then moving onafter that.
And if I were to look at my owncareer progression, I would say
early, early in my career, Iwas an expert you know, believe
it or not at this point incomputers and programming and
(24:41):
kind of made a little name formyself.
And then analysis of data whichmoved into planning, which
moved into market research,which moved, etc.
Etc.
And I think there's some levelof truth to that, compared to
trying to be the jack of alltrades and just some of your
thoughts around there.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
I appreciate hearing From a just was on a family trip
and my kids got sick and wepassed them off to grandparents,
and so congratulations on beinga grandparent and thank you for
your service on behalf of yourson and family.
There is some magic, I think,to time and effort, and so I say
(25:25):
that when doing one thing atone time and there's certainly
now at this stage of my careerand probably at all stages I
sort of did a few things at afew times.
But I think that the time andeffort aspect my very first
hospital CEO boss during myadministrative fellowship, had a
famous quote and had the mugthat said if you don't ASK, you
(25:47):
don't get.
And so he was constantly if youdon't ask, you don't get, which
was was ingrained into so manyof our heads and we love and
appreciate him for that.
But what we realized is in hisposition, both in the community
and his personal life and in therole in the organization, is he
just got so many ASKS.
Always there's always someonecoming up asking for more money
(26:10):
for their department budget, fordifferent food at the annual
Christmas dinner, for differentwhatever it was, and you start
to notice a pattern in who yousay yes to at an executive level
.
And so if you come in, just inthe basic sense, if you were a
department lead, and you come upto the CEO, main executive,
(26:31):
setting the budget and you say,hey, I want more money for my
department, and they say, why?
And you're like I just, I wantmore money, I don't have enough
money, like whatever it is.
You can just imagine already inyour head like it's very hard
to say yes to that.
But if you come up and you say,hey, we need more money for our
department because we've triedXYZ, we've done this for two
(26:53):
years, we've looked at otherorganizations that do this,
they're doing so, and so youhave that whole why and logic
and here's the work we've putinto it.
It's so much easier for him tosay yes.
And so if you just extrapolatethat to every other aspect of
life if you're looking for a job, or if you're an, or if you're
a student, and you're saying,hey, I want to stand out amongst
(27:15):
my peers and I want to do thistype of job, if you're, if
you're, if the ask is, hey, Iwant this job, but the why
behind it is because I want it,or because it pays more than
others, or because if the whybehind it is, I've put two years
or six months or six weeks,whatever it is.
I've put this amount of time andeffort into learning about
(27:37):
people who do this job.
I've interviewed them, I'vetalked to them.
I went over to thisorganization and knocked on the
door and found out a little bitmore.
I've put together a guide forother students who might want
this job.
I've done things, and so Ithink there there's magic in
that time and effort that goesinto, usually one thing at a
time, and so if you're known forhey, that's the one thing you
(27:58):
did, you're probably able to dothe next thing too, and so some
of that bet and some of that yesthat people will say to you is
based off of your ever in thebeginning.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
No, it's, it's so true, and being an acknowledged
expert in one area but beingable to pivot and kind of help
and assist in other areas iscertainly something to kind of
move forward.
And I also it's interestingfrom a Cami perspective when we
look for people on our boards.
(28:29):
What we're looking for ourexperts in one area, but who
also can kind of take that levelof expertise and apply it to
higher education or apply it tohealth care management or to
students or or to the like, andthat ability to kind of draw
connections in between there isimportant.
Now you mentioned somethingelse too Importance of finding
(28:52):
people to root for you in yourcorner.
And how can, how can, studentsfind people to root for them?
Speaker 2 (29:04):
You mentioned crying earlier.
I think I've cried at everyyoung health leader so they
always say, like when I get amicrophone I cry, it's because
I'm so grateful for the peoplethat we've seen.
It's been me and Antoine quitea bit, that have been the final
deliverers of some checks andsome brands that we've been able
to work with, to go out andgive those sponsorship dollars.
(29:25):
We get to be this sort ofhandoff.
The tears that come fromcommunity members usually are
directed at us.
It's been just incredible whata little bit of money or a
little bit of time, a little bitof resource can do to people's
lives and how much it changesthem.
You asked this question howstudents position themselves to
(29:46):
find people rooting their corner.
I think, unfortunately, theanswer is going to be trial and
error.
You almost have to surroundyourself with enough people or
put yourself out there enoughtimes that you will find those
people.
I think one thing that I seeearly in a career that's so
unfortunate to me is, as astudent, oftentimes going back
(30:07):
to that conference networkingstandpoint.
It's oftentimes networking upthe first person that gives you
time, that is externallysuccessful to you, whether
that's by lifestyle or title orsalary, whatever it might be.
I see students fall into a trapof I'm going to listen to
everything this person saysbecause they have maybe portions
(30:27):
or aspects that I want, whetherit's title, salary, whatever.
I see people start making lifedecisions based on this person's
telling me this and it got themto where they're going and so I
want to do this, even thoughtheir own expectations, reality,
skill set, passions, all thethings may be so completely
opposed to that person that'sgiving them the advice.
(30:48):
Some of it is.
I think you've got to findpeople that are going to root
for you.
Some of that again is trial anderror.
I give you the example.
I've switched careers and careerpaths a few times and been
recruited to organizations.
I've searched out organizationson my own and so I've had some
of those different opportunities.
(31:10):
In one case, I had a wonderfulexperience with my boss, a great
relationship in things.
It was hard to say hey.
You have to have that crucialconversation one day of hey.
I found another job and it'slooking like it progressed far
enough that I'm going to have tosay yes to their offer.
It means I'm going to have toleave this team and organization
and put her in a tough spot.
(31:31):
I had that tough conversationwith a boss one day and the
reaction was I'm so excited foryou.
Me and my husband and my familywant to take your family out to
dinner to celebrate.
Imagine that I'm putting theorganization her, whatever, and
it's not that I'm so importantthat I'm putting them in a tough
bind, but they have to recruitsomeone new.
(31:51):
They have a little bit of timeout of their schedule to now
have to figure out a new personon the team, all the things.
But I've had that experience ofwe want to take your family out
to celebrate you getting a newjob and maybe they were
celebrating me leaving the team.
I guess that could be the otheranswer.
But I've also had theexperience of leaving a job and
having a boss call people inthat new job and sort of not bad
(32:16):
mouth but not be as excited forme as possible, or to say hey,
he's leaving the team because ofthis or hey, he's leaving this
organization because of this, orso you really start to see some
differences in the way peoplereact around you to the
different life choices that youmake and you want to find people
that are going to take you outto dinner when you win.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Yeah, it is an interesting part of life when
you kind of do that, and I'vehad that same situation where
I've said to people, hey, I'mgoing to, and the general
feeling when they say, wow,congratulations, this sounds
like a great move for you.
Anything I can do to help youalong in that part, let me know,
(32:59):
is just a wonderful feeling tokind of have, and I'm sure, alex
, you've had more of those thanthe latter.
I have to say this has been agreat conversation.
I've enjoyed getting to knowyou the past couple of weeks in
a little more detail.
I have to say, talking to youit makes you feel more
(33:25):
optimistic about where we'regoing as a society and what
people like you are doing tomake health care better and to
make everyone else better.
So, alex, with that, thank youvery much for being on our
podcast and appreciate all youdo.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Anthony, thank you so much.
I really appreciate thisrooting for you, rooting for
Kami and rooting for all thestudents.
If I can just say one lastthing, I think so many students
are looking for advice when theyjust need someone to give them
confidence, and so I thinkthere's a lot right now that are
going through school saying Idon't feel, or going through the
(34:03):
first few years of their careeror whatever it is, saying I
don't feel like I'm on the rightpath or I'm not making a
difference in my role, I want abigger title, I want whatever.
And a lot of them are lookingfor advice of hey, tell me what
to do.
And I think, in so many of thecases of students that I talk to
, you're doing so much more thanany student I've ever seen and
(34:24):
you're doing amazing things andyou're in incredible
opportunities and you're doingthings.
So sometimes it's just give ita little time, give it a little
bit more of a runway of whatyou're doing and where you're
doing.
Follow those pulls versuspushes and so the things you're
pulled to.
But so much of it is justconfidence.
I think students are absolutelyincredible, are making such a
(34:46):
difference in the world, so muchmore than they know so often
and they're contributing ideasand the world is going to be so
much better because of what theycreate and what we get to
experience with them.
And so just that advice firstconfidence.
If we can just give that littledose of optimism to people day
by day, I think I'm excited toexperience the world that I've
seen students talk about andwhat they're creating, alex
(35:10):
great advice and be confident inyourself, and I think you'll go
go further.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
I think that's a great advice for students.
Well, with that, alex, thankyou again very much for being
part of the call.
Thank you, Melissa, for that introduction and a warm
welcome today to AlexMayersberger, who is joining us
on a special call today, andI've had some discussions with
Alex around his work with theAdvancement League.
I'm really excited to talk tohim.
He is a young professionalwho's making a difference.
And, Alex, just to kind ofbegin, could you give us a
(00:23):
little bit of your backstoryabout you know?
You graduated from a CamiAccredited Program, University
of Utah, and right now you're aglobal expert at SAS.
So can you kind of fill thegroup in with that a little bit?
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, it's such an honor to be here as well.
I think we'll probably get intoit a little bit, but this is a
full circle moment in my life,as you mentioned a graduate from
a Cami Accredited Program andat one point, choosing graduate
school obviously is a big lifedecision.
There's student loans.
I had a young child duringgraduate school, and so it was
family dynamics, all the thingsand the program that I went to
(01:00):
actually, when I firstregistered for school, was not
Cami Accredited, and so it wasthat leap of faith.
But the leap of faith that Iwas taking was because the
program director had promised atwhat point she said we will be
Cami Accredited by the end ofyour tenure here, and so it was
a bet I was making, and a largepart of that bet was on that
Cami Accreditation, and so Iremember just the sleepless
(01:24):
nights and the worries of makingsure that the word Cami means a
lot to me personally, and sothis is super exciting.
So, like you said, I leadglobal product marketing for
healthcare at SAS data andanalytics and AI company, which
is really exciting.
It's been a fun career journey.
I've gone from small healthtech startup to hospital
(01:47):
administrator, to insuranceleader, to global technology
leader and so kind of traversedthe healthcare ecosystem bingo
card.
And along the way, a fewfriends and I created the Young
Health Leader Summit leadingevent for early career
professionals.
And now, as our hair gets alittle grayer on the sides, we
(02:08):
have a good mentor of ours andone of our early career CEOs, dr
David Feinberg, who's nowchairman of Oracle.
He jokes that as we've kept theevent going, that it needs to
be called the Middle Age Summit,at least now.
So we've had a lot of fun alongthe way.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Alex, there's an interesting point in your career
journey where all of a suddenyou go from the young person
who's the exciting youngprofessional to the
mid-careerist that everyone goesto advice, to the older
statesmen or the elder statesmen, and you don't notice those
trends kind of going in yourcareer but they do happen and
(02:45):
they're kind of startling inyour professional career.
I love SAS, I have to say.
I know it's known as the SASInstitute now and kudos for
working there.
I used SAS back in myundergraduate day with punch
cards so I mean that's how old Iam and again that journey
(03:05):
through there.
But SAS is really one of theleading statistical packages
that was out there and they'vecertainly brought in their
perspective and really kind ofneat that you're the global lead
there, so that's kind of cool.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yeah, it's an incredible place and I think
people recognize SAS from a lotof the Forbes articles or the
cultural aspect of it.
They're very unique.
It's been a private company for50 years and so it's been a
unique way to reinvest inemployees.
They've created this amazingcampus environment where we have
a health care center that has alot of unique aspects for the
(03:43):
way they take care of theiremployees physical, mental,
emotional health, as well assoccer fields and pools and all
the fun stuff as well.
So you'll have a call with acolleague at 10 am sometimes
they just came from a workintramural soccer game and
you're like, wait a minute, whyam I not out playing soccer?
But the other exciting thing,like you said, is they've been
(04:05):
able to reinvest so much backinto the platform and the
programming and so it started asthat statistical language and
has now really evolved into anend-to-end platform and so
really interesting things.
I call it sort of foundationaland future of some of the
foundational back endinfrastructure type things,
(04:25):
cohort building within to targetdiabetic populations or for
payers, or different things, aswell as future predictive models
and governing the newest AI,and so really, really fun, lots
of great customers and, to yourpoint lots of great customers
that we've had for 50 years or40 or 50 years around the world,
(04:46):
and so you really get to hearsome insight into the stories of
how is this hospital dealingwith the optimization of their
staffing workforce in Spain.
And then you get to go to apayer in Indianapolis or
wherever it is in the UnitedStates and you get to hear how
have they been dealing withthese challenges and what are
they doing, what have they beeninvesting in over the last 20
years from a technologystandpoint?
(05:06):
And so it's been an incrediblelearning place and an incredible
leading place.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Now one of the fascinating things to me about
SAS is their investment in youand your mission around the
advancement league.
I mean, you see, sas isinvolved with that.
And again, what makes a companya great company A great company
is when they invest in thoughtleadership and they're not just
worried about selling you astatistical package, they're
worrying about how do we movethe field forward.
(05:33):
And when I look at what SAS didwith you in the advancement
league, to me that kind ofrepresents a great company kind
of moving forward.
And so a little bit about theadvancement league.
I think you and I have talkedabout it before in the past.
What really is interesting tome around that is how you and a
(05:56):
gentleman named Antoine Williamsgot together and said, hey, we
have an idea and we're going tomove forward with it.
So if you could kind of tellour listeners about that idea.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Yeah, early career is very difficult and I think it's
very difficult to articulatesort of what you're going
through, especially in what wedid was an administrative
fellowship program together, andso you are reporting to the CEO
of a hospital.
Very early in your career.
You have this very in-depthlook at executive leadership and
you're tasked with some reallyimportant responsibilities.
(06:29):
The challenge is you're beingtrained to be a hospital CEO and
if you feel somewhere withinyour skill set or your heart
that you don't want to be ahospital CEO, it's really hard.
Who do you tell that to?
You can't go to your boss andbe like hey, you've invested a
bunch of money and time andeffort into me and now I'm
realizing I don't want to dothis.
(06:50):
And it's really hard to go tosome even program members that
are sort of at the same time asyou, because in some ways you're
competing with them for afuture role, and so it becomes
really difficult to articulatehey, I'm struggling here, I
don't know that this is a fitfor me, what else is out there?
And you're also just so busywith work and maybe some of your
(07:11):
personal life, your startingyoung family, whatever it is
that it just gets reallydifficult to surround yourself
with new people, and so ifyou're surrounded by all
hospital people and you say, hey, I don't know if I want to work
in a hospital anymore, how doyou go out and find the time and
find the people to get someresources around?
What else is out there in theworld?
And so we were really fortunateto create a close friendship
(07:32):
Myself, antoine Williams, samBelukoff, who's now out at
Kaiser.
Of all the hard jobs in theworld, he leads Moanalua Medical
Center in Honolulu, hawaii.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Oh I feel bad for him , right.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yes, we came from some tough days in Northeast
Pennsylvania and guys and hertogether, and we've all headed
to warmer locations.
I'm now in North Carolina.
Antoine is down at OrlandoHealth after some stints in
Detroit, michigan as well atHenry Ford.
But really it started as we hadsome of these conversations at
lunch or things where we'd sayhey, and it was usually me, I
(08:06):
was probably the odd man out oflike, hey, I don't know if I
signed up for all of this andwhat else is out there.
And so they'd say, hey, I havea friend that went to grad
school that didn't choose thehospital path.
Maybe you could reach out tohim or maybe you could talk to
her.
And so we started saying, hey,if we're having these
conversations, maybe it's, maybethere's other people like us
that are having theseconversations and there's no
(08:27):
real place that we can go tohave them.
So we actually just posted a Ithink the original one was on
Instagram and it was called ahealth care road trip and we
said we've got a couple friendsvisiting from a hospital out in
Cleveland.
They're going to be in townspending the night at our house
for the weekend.
If anybody wants to come meetup with us on a Saturday morning
.
We've got a few people ready totalk health care, and the first
(08:50):
health care road trip that wehosted there were people that we
did not know.
It just speaks to the power ofthe internet too.
People that we did not knowrented cars in New York City and
drove three and a half hoursout to Danville, pennsylvania
which if you've ever been there,it's a little tough to navigate
to and get to and showed upthat morning to say, hey, we
want to talk health care.
We saw this on the internet,and so that snowballed into an
(09:13):
event called the Young HealthLeader Summit.
We said can we do this in amore coordinated way?
Can we do it more meaningfully?
And we're now in year six ofthat.
And then the Advancement Leagueis the wraparound package of
what we do outside of the event.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
It's fascinating.
I have been to Danville and,yes, it is kind of in the middle
of northeastern Pennsylvania, alittle bit of a ride from New
York City, a little bit of aride from Philadelphia, but an
incredible great system out atGeisinger to kind of spend some
time with.
There was a quote from PhilHudson, who's the CEO of Rock
(09:46):
Digital, and it was interestingCEO of Rock Digital and
screenwriter is what he listedas his title and he said Alex
has a unique ability to bringout the best in every, unique
ability to bring out the best ineveryone.
Alex, I don't know if you'veever heard me kind of talk to
students.
I mean, one of the things Ialways say to them is don't
(10:07):
network.
And they kind of look at melike I've got a third eye Help
people.
And I think what to me isimpressive about your journey is
you are really helping people,you are bringing out the best in
other people, you're creatingavenues for discussion that help
other people kind of moveforward and while doing that,
(10:29):
significantly helps yourself.
But I don't think you look atit as an approach of how do I,
alex, get better at the expenseof others, or who are the people
that I need to network higher,higher up in the chain, but how
do I kind of move everyoneforward with me and by doing
that, creating an amazingnetwork of people?
(10:50):
Your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
First, thanks for bringing up the Phil Hudson
quote.
What a great memory from thepast.
Those are an incredible personand screenwriter.
I believe he's got a newNetflix special but he's the
producer for of.
I think it's called Tacomasomething Tacoma FD it's a
firefighting comedy show, soplease go check that out.
So the quote about trying tohelp other people are bringing
(11:15):
out the best in other people.
I joke that I was blessed withthe anti-Michael Jordan gene,
where Michael Jordan once isknown for that hyper
competitiveness.
I actually just I love to seeother people win and it's
somewhere in my human naturethat I think there's room for
all of us and so if you win itdoesn't feel like oh shoot, I
(11:36):
lost, or I guess it's hey,someone else won and my time's
coming.
And I think some of that spawnsfrom just a fortunate position
to sort of be able to experiencea lot of different things in
life.
And one of the reallyunfortunate things I think that
I've seen at all differentstages of life unfortunately, is
(11:57):
friends pass away young becauseof drug addiction or car
crashes or just the difficultiesof life, and I've seen friends
near me go from sort of we'llcall it like low level
management to CEO in a veryshort span as well.
And so you see those two flipsides, or I've seen people kind
(12:18):
of seemingly have it all andlose it all very quickly.
And so I think those experiencesin life, the more you have them
and maybe the earlier you hadthem, makes it so that you
realize that everyone around youoffers something and you can
offer everyone around yousomething.
And so you truly sort of justdon't know what tomorrow brings.
(12:40):
And so the best thing I see somany people from a networking
perspective, exactly like yousaid, you sort of network up
naturally.
And so you go to an event andyou're like hey, and we've all
had that experience as well.
If you have that name badgehanging from your chest at an
event, I've had people come upand they look at you on the
elevator and your title isn'timportant enough, and you sort
(13:01):
of get that they read the titlereal quick and just immediately
turned back around instead ofhey, this is another human in
front of me.
What's going on in your life,what's interesting, what do you
like to do, all the things?
And so that person today mayhave a title that doesn't mean
anything to you, but tomorrowmay be the person that's leading
your division or at yourcompany doing something, and so
I've been really fortunate tosee some of those things in life
(13:23):
and it's really given me a goodperspective of the person next
to you can really be in yourneed today, or you can be in
their need tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Alex, you know what, and I remember being there.
I remember being at aconference and I was having a
conversation with someone andall of a sudden he caught the
badge of someone who was higherup than the manager of Graduate
Health Systems InformationCenter and he went by and then
(13:52):
off he went and I just Iremember kind of thinking, yeah,
that's an interesting way tonetwork, you know, and don't
remember whatever happened tothat person.
I wonder where they went inthere.
But I think it's a great lessonfor everyone to kind of talk
about is have a genuine interestin people and don't necessarily
(14:13):
worry about what's in it.
For me, and I think that's kindof the approach that you've
taken, you know, as we kind oftalked about the Advancement
League and what you're doingwith the Young Health Leaders
Summit, so talk a little bitabout the Young Health Leaders
Summit, where you know youtalked about its origins and
where it's beginning, and I'velooked at some of the YouTube
(14:34):
videos on it and some of theInstagram postings on it and
you've got something going there.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
So appreciate that we're so blessed and fortunate
to attract so many incredibleleaders from across the
healthcare ecosystem now, and soit probably started out quite a
bit with our kind of hospitaland network and people that were
genuinely interested in, hey, Iwant to be around other young
people or I want to be aroundother people at this stage of a
career.
And then, as we've progressedin our careers and sort of
(15:03):
traversed some of the healthcareecosystem, started to attract
some executives and some peoplewho want to give back, and so
now it's really this we call itthis magical mix of the kindest
collection of healthcare talent.
I think some people come to theYoung Health Leaders Summit.
There's sort of a naturalinclination so, naming it Young
Health Leaders Summit, youdefinitely get some early MHA
(15:23):
type students, mbas, mphs, a fewundergrads, and so you attract
some students.
You attract some people veryearly in their careers, maybe
first five years, whether it'shospital or health tech or other
ones.
And then what we've found theselast few years especially is
it's such a different world foryoung people right now because
of economic inflation, maybeeconomic uncertainty, just the
(15:46):
differing experiences that we'vegone through these last few
years that there's companiesthat want to attract these
people to their companies.
Or there's executives who wantto give back to mentor, who want
to be inspired to say, hey,what are the new technologies
that early careerists arelooking at?
What should we be thinkingabout as an organization that
we're thinking about differently.
And so this year we're soexcited.
(16:06):
We're in year six.
We've learned a lot, tested alot along the years.
Actually, you mentioned namebadges.
That we've all had thatexperience at an event.
We do no name badges.
Actually, the first year we didno name badges.
Second year we did no namebadges.
There's something magical aboutjust being in a room with
incredible people and saying youhave to sort of force yourself
(16:26):
to say this is my name, what'syours?
But as we've grown throughoutthe years now a couple hundred
people strong, at these events,we do a blank name badge on day
one and so you write whateveryou want to write and it's been
very powerful of a lot of peoplewill write their first name,
maybe organization.
Some people will write I'mlooking for a job, or I'm
looking for someone to be aguest on my podcast, whatever it
(16:49):
is.
And so we've seen justincredible relationships.
So incredible casual, try tokeep it.
And so before it's a casualaddress code, there's something
unique about being in shorts andhanging out with an executive
that just you can't get anywhereelse.
And this year is there's goingto be some magic, both in the
people.
There's definitely compoundinginterest in the finance world
(17:09):
and so if you invest, there'scompounding over time.
There's absolutely compoundinginterest in harassing people by
email.
So if you invite them in yearone, they don't respond.
Invite them year two, theydon't respond.
Invite them year three, theydon't respond.
Invite them year four, they say,hey, I'm busy those days.
Year five, they say hey, I'mbusy the years, those days.
(17:30):
And year six, we've had thespeakers that we tried to reach
out to in year one reach out tous and say, hey, how can we be
part of the Young Health LeaderSummit?
We'd love to come, we'd love tobe a part of it, and so
compounding interest in reachingout to people or doing anything
for six years straight, amagical mix of people and a
magical place in Windwood inMiami.
And so, for all the thought andenergy and effort we've put
(17:52):
into the people and the content,the agenda, the thoughtfulness
of the design of experiencesthat you'll have, everyone hears
all that and kind of then hearsMiami and they're like, oh yeah
, we'll be there, we'll be there.
We're slightly offended.
We have to lead with it.
It's in Miami in May, and so bea good time.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
There was an interesting part.
I read about what you do, too,with the Advancement League and
tell me if I got this wrong, butI read this and I was like, wow
, what an incredibly great idea.
You encourage sponsors to theorganization, but what you do is
you take the sponsorship moneyand you divide it up among the
(18:34):
attendees who have to use it forsome community impact.
Comment that I read was you'reserious about helping members
put health everywhere and thecomment is people get so
involved in that process oftaking that money and making an
impact that you see people intears and your goal is not to
(18:58):
get people crying, but you'vegot people really kind of
invested in making animprovement in the community.
Talk about how that came to be.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
It came the very first conference that we ever
went to, on the sort ofcompany's dime we'll call it.
We got sent to a conference andwe sort of were very early in a
career, and so early in acareer you're also very hyper
aware of your own financialstanding and the investment of
time and opportunity.
And so we went to this eventand we definitely wore our
(19:30):
nicest clothes and we sat aroundand ate at restaurants that we
probably had never eaten atbefore and saw the bills and all
the things.
And when we came back and hadto sort of report out on what we
did, it was the realizationsort of struck us of a lot of
the health care events that wego to.
We sort of were seeing thatmoney.
It was like we spent a bunch ofour organization's money.
(19:51):
We went and we talked about allthe health care problems, we
ate some fancy dinners and thenwe're right back in the place
that we were to start with.
And so we had a little bit ofthat realization that, hey, if
we ever have the chance to do ameaningful, large scale event,
we would do some good while wewere there.
And the other thought was,could you do some good in a lot
of different cities, and so ifwe held an event, could we do it
(20:13):
in 10 different cities or 100different cities throughout the
years, meaning that if you cameto our event every year, you now
had a chance to experience andgive back to those cities in a
meaningful way, and so you'dhave this just different
perspective across your careerof hey.
I've been to Memphis, tennessee,and I spent some time there
over a couple of days getting toknow people in the community
(20:33):
and working with them and seeingsome of the struggles and
challenges they had, and so it'sbeen an incredible run.
We've done it for five yearswhere we take physical cash from
sponsors, give it to attendees,put them in a group of
strangers, essentially, and givethem 24 hours and say your only
objective is to go out into thecommunity and spend it in a way
that makes a difference.
It's been absolutely incredible.
(20:54):
We've seen communities change,we've seen careers change, but
the story I always tells thatthere's a person that went was a
hospital administrator, gotthis envelope of cash which only
one group has ever lost theenvelope of cash they just
default brain, put it in abackpack and were like shoot, I
don't know where it is.
So we had people crawling underchairs trying to find it, but
we found it.
(21:16):
But she was in this group andbasically, with a group of
strangers of just a little bitof cash, was able to say, like
I'm willing to fight these otherstrangers to make sure that we
spend this money on pediatricmental health.
I think the most good that wecan do is helping the mental
health of young people.
It's going to change the future.
It changes communities, all thethings.
(21:36):
And then the realization struckof like now that I'm forced to
go put my money wherever mymouth is in a way that makes a
difference for a healthierfuture.
I don't actually do any of thatin my day job.
I have no relation to pediatricmental health and so shortly
after the event went back,started to research which
companies are tackling thisjoint, a startup in the
pediatric mental health space,and so the outcome of life maybe
(21:59):
changes in the outcome ofcareers and the good that she'll
be able to do in the worldchanged because of just a forced
exercise to say, if you reallyhave to spend money in a way
that you think makes adifference, where do you spend
it?
This year is going to be ourfirst year to change up actually
the impact competition.
We've learned so much from itand done so much good from it.
We're really going to startpartnering with some local
(22:22):
organizations that have longterm commitment to their the
home communities where we serve,and so this will be the first
year of, instead of that, 24hour community impact
competition.
It's going to be a hopefullylong term community impact on,
and so we have a pitchcompetition, still giving
sponsorship money, but workingwith some local organizations to
(22:44):
bring all that externalexpertise into the local
community and then pass it alongto people who are there and who
can continue it over time.
So we're excited to see how wecan evolve and see where it
takes it.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Alex, what an incredibly insightful approach
to take and what a really greatway to make an impact in the
community.
By making that impact in thecommunity, you're also
influencing people's careersdevelopment too in that process.
So it's a win-win all aroundand congratulations on doing
that.
Again.
(23:16):
I'll be reading a little bitmore about you in preparation
for this, and we do our homeworkwhen we talk to our guests.
One of the things that you wrotewas the importance of learning
to do one thing at a time andbecoming an expert in that one
thing at a time, and I had aconversation.
(23:37):
Why that really kind of stuck tome is.
I had a conversation with my sona couple weeks ago and I'm
actually a grandfather nowwatching my granddaughter
approach nine months at thispoint and we were talking about
how the pediatricians said whatlittle kids do is they focus on
(23:58):
one developmental task, and thatcould be crawling or could be
babbling, or, but they reallywork on doing that until they
become an expert on it and thenthey move on to the next.
And those two kind of thoughtscame to mind as I was reading
what you wrote and what my sonwas talking to me about and I
(24:18):
went hey, there's something inthere about becoming an expert
in an area and then moving onafter that.
And if I were to look at my owncareer progression, I would say
early, early in my career, Iwas an expert you know, believe
it or not at this point incomputers and programming and
(24:41):
kind of made a little name formyself.
And then analysis of data whichmoved into planning, which
moved into market research,which moved, etc.
Etc.
And I think there's some levelof truth to that, compared to
trying to be the jack of alltrades and just some of your
thoughts around there.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
I appreciate hearing From a just was on a family trip
and my kids got sick and wepassed them off to grandparents,
and so congratulations on beinga grandparent and thank you for
your service on behalf of yourson and family.
There is some magic, I think,to time and effort, and so I say
(25:25):
that when doing one thing atone time and there's certainly
now at this stage of my careerand probably at all stages I
sort of did a few things at afew times.
But I think that the time andeffort aspect my very first
hospital CEO boss during myadministrative fellowship, had a
famous quote and had the mugthat said if you don't ASK, you
(25:47):
don't get.
And so he was constantly if youdon't ask, you don't get, which
was was ingrained into so manyof our heads and we love and
appreciate him for that.
But what we realized is in hisposition, both in the community
and his personal life and in therole in the organization, is he
just got so many ASKS.
Always there's always someonecoming up asking for more money
(26:10):
for their department budget, fordifferent food at the annual
Christmas dinner, for differentwhatever it was, and you start
to notice a pattern in who yousay yes to at an executive level
.
And so if you come in, just inthe basic sense, if you were a
department lead, and you come upto the CEO, main executive,
(26:31):
setting the budget and you say,hey, I want more money for my
department, and they say, why?
And you're like I just, I wantmore money, I don't have enough
money, like whatever it is.
You can just imagine already inyour head like it's very hard
to say yes to that.
But if you come up and you say,hey, we need more money for our
department because we've triedXYZ, we've done this for two
(26:53):
years, we've looked at otherorganizations that do this,
they're doing so, and so youhave that whole why and logic
and here's the work we've putinto it.
It's so much easier for him tosay yes.
And so if you just extrapolatethat to every other aspect of
life if you're looking for a job, or if you're an, or if you're
a student, and you're saying,hey, I want to stand out amongst
(27:15):
my peers and I want to do thistype of job, if you're, if
you're, if the ask is, hey, Iwant this job, but the why
behind it is because I want it,or because it pays more than
others, or because if the whybehind it is, I've put two years
or six months or six weeks,whatever it is.
I've put this amount of time andeffort into learning about
(27:37):
people who do this job.
I've interviewed them, I'vetalked to them.
I went over to thisorganization and knocked on the
door and found out a little bitmore.
I've put together a guide forother students who might want
this job.
I've done things, and so Ithink there there's magic in
that time and effort that goesinto, usually one thing at a
time, and so if you're known forhey, that's the one thing you
(27:58):
did, you're probably able to dothe next thing too, and so some
of that bet and some of that yesthat people will say to you is
based off of your ever in thebeginning.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
No, it's, it's so true, and being an acknowledged
expert in one area but beingable to pivot and kind of help
and assist in other areas iscertainly something to kind of
move forward.
And I also it's interestingfrom a Cami perspective when we
look for people on our boards.
(28:29):
What we're looking for ourexperts in one area, but who
also can kind of take that levelof expertise and apply it to
higher education or apply it tohealth care management or to
students or or to the like, andthat ability to kind of draw
connections in between there isimportant.
Now you mentioned somethingelse too Importance of finding
(28:52):
people to root for you in yourcorner.
And how can, how can, studentsfind people to root for them?
Speaker 2 (29:04):
You mentioned crying earlier.
I think I've cried at everyyoung health leader so they
always say, like when I get amicrophone I cry, it's because
I'm so grateful for the peoplethat we've seen.
It's been me and Antoine quitea bit, that have been the final
deliverers of some checks andsome brands that we've been able
to work with, to go out andgive those sponsorship dollars.
(29:25):
We get to be this sort ofhandoff.
The tears that come fromcommunity members usually are
directed at us.
It's been just incredible whata little bit of money or a
little bit of time, a little bitof resource can do to people's
lives and how much it changesthem.
You asked this question howstudents position themselves to
(29:46):
find people rooting their corner.
I think, unfortunately, theanswer is going to be trial and
error.
You almost have to surroundyourself with enough people or
put yourself out there enoughtimes that you will find those
people.
I think one thing that I seeearly in a career that's so
unfortunate to me is, as astudent, oftentimes going back
(30:07):
to that conference networkingstandpoint.
It's oftentimes networking upthe first person that gives you
time, that is externallysuccessful to you, whether
that's by lifestyle or title orsalary, whatever it might be.
I see students fall into a trapof I'm going to listen to
everything this person saysbecause they have maybe portions
(30:27):
or aspects that I want, whetherit's title, salary, whatever.
I see people start making lifedecisions based on this person's
telling me this and it got themto where they're going and so I
want to do this, even thoughtheir own expectations, reality,
skill set, passions, all thethings may be so completely
opposed to that person that'sgiving them the advice.
(30:48):
Some of it is.
I think you've got to findpeople that are going to root
for you.
Some of that again is trial anderror.
I give you the example.
I've switched careers and careerpaths a few times and been
recruited to organizations.
I've searched out organizationson my own and so I've had some
of those different opportunities.
(31:10):
In one case, I had a wonderfulexperience with my boss, a great
relationship in things.
It was hard to say hey.
You have to have that crucialconversation one day of hey.
I found another job and it'slooking like it progressed far
enough that I'm going to have tosay yes to their offer.
It means I'm going to have toleave this team and organization
and put her in a tough spot.
(31:31):
I had that tough conversationwith a boss one day and the
reaction was I'm so excited foryou.
Me and my husband and my familywant to take your family out to
dinner to celebrate.
Imagine that I'm putting theorganization her, whatever, and
it's not that I'm so importantthat I'm putting them in a tough
bind, but they have to recruitsomeone new.
(31:51):
They have a little bit of timeout of their schedule to now
have to figure out a new personon the team, all the things.
But I've had that experience ofwe want to take your family out
to celebrate you getting a newjob and maybe they were
celebrating me leaving the team.
I guess that could be the otheranswer.
But I've also had theexperience of leaving a job and
having a boss call people inthat new job and sort of not bad
(32:16):
mouth but not be as excited forme as possible, or to say hey,
he's leaving the team because ofthis or hey, he's leaving this
organization because of this, orso you really start to see some
differences in the way peoplereact around you to the
different life choices that youmake and you want to find people
that are going to take you outto dinner when you win.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Yeah, it is an interesting part of life when
you kind of do that, and I'vehad that same situation where
I've said to people, hey, I'mgoing to, and the general
feeling when they say, wow,congratulations, this sounds
like a great move for you.
Anything I can do to help youalong in that part, let me know,
(32:59):
is just a wonderful feeling tokind of have, and I'm sure, alex
, you've had more of those thanthe latter.
I have to say this has been agreat conversation.
I've enjoyed getting to knowyou the past couple of weeks in
a little more detail.
I have to say, talking to youit makes you feel more
(33:25):
optimistic about where we'regoing as a society and what
people like you are doing tomake health care better and to
make everyone else better.
So, alex, with that, thank youvery much for being on our
podcast and appreciate all youdo.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Anthony, thank you so much.
I really appreciate thisrooting for you, rooting for
Kami and rooting for all thestudents.
If I can just say one lastthing, I think so many students
are looking for advice when theyjust need someone to give them
confidence, and so I thinkthere's a lot right now that are
going through school saying Idon't feel, or going through the
(34:03):
first few years of their careeror whatever it is, saying I
don't feel like I'm on the rightpath or I'm not making a
difference in my role, I want abigger title, I want whatever.
And a lot of them are lookingfor advice of hey, tell me what
to do.
And I think, in so many of thecases of students that I talk to
, you're doing so much more thanany student I've ever seen and
(34:24):
you're doing amazing things andyou're in incredible
opportunities and you're doingthings.
So sometimes it's just give ita little time, give it a little
bit more of a runway of whatyou're doing and where you're
doing.
Follow those pulls versuspushes and so the things you're
pulled to.
But so much of it is justconfidence.
I think students are absolutelyincredible, are making such a
(34:46):
difference in the world, so muchmore than they know so often
and they're contributing ideasand the world is going to be so
much better because of what theycreate and what we get to
experience with them.
And so just that advice firstconfidence.
If we can just give that littledose of optimism to people day
by day, I think I'm excited toexperience the world that I've
seen students talk about andwhat they're creating, alex
(35:10):
great advice and be confident inyourself, and I think you'll go
go further.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
I think that's a great advice for students.
Well, with that, alex, thankyou again very much for being
part of the call.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.